Vegetarian Zombies
by Cheloya
Summary: Reeve, Marlene, and childhood dreams.


Title: Vegetarian Zombies  
Fandom: Final Fantasy VII  
Characters: Marlene, Reeve  
Words: 695  
Notes: NaNo challenge for 50k30days over at DeadJournal. 

- - -

"You what?"

Round brown eyes the size of plums stared up at Reeve, as though she thought he was stupid. "I wanna be a zombie when I grow up," she repeated. She definitely thought he was stupid. That made two of them. He laughed.

"Why'd you want to be a thing like that, kiddo?" He reached out a hand, and she dutifully slapped a screwdriver into it. Then she held out her hands in front of her, rolled her great big doll-eyes and moaned, quite convincingly. Reeve made a show of dropping his screwdriver, and Marlene giggled.

"It wouldn't hurt if you got a scraped knee!" She declared, as though this was very important - and since she had scraped her knee that very morning, it probably was, to her. (Actually, now he thought about it, it was pretty important to Reeve, too - her yelling about it had given him one heck of a headache.) "And, and, you could eat things no one else could eat, like bugs, and scare stup-- mean people like Ryo!"

Reeve grimaced. "But zombies eat people. And kittens. You wouldn't eat Cait Sith, would you?"

The aforementioned kitten was curled happily in Elmyra's china cabinet. No matter how often she came and shooed him out, he stubbornly returned to the shelf to snooze his days away. Reeve had begun to discreetly wash the dishes before dinner as well as after.

Marlene looked appalled. "I wouldn't eat Catshee!" She cried, clenching her little baby fists. Reeve wondered how Barret could bring himself to leave the room, let alone the country when his adopted daughter was this gods-be-damned cute. "I'll... I'll be a vegetarian zombie!"

Reeve couldn't help the snort of laughter that escaped him. "And you'll, what, eat live lettuce, still in the earth? Apples, straight from the tree?" His lips tugged to the side as he spoke, though he tried desperately to keep the smirk from his face. Marlene hated being laughed at - most kids did, now he thought about it. "You'd have to rip them apart with your bare hands - but be careful with berries, they have thorns," he cautioned, remembering the bramble at the back of Elmyra's garden and the frequent tears in Marlene's dresses.

Aeris' old dresses. Elmyra still bit her lip and turned away when Marlene skipped by wearing them.

Marlene rolled her enormous eyes at him. "No, Mister Reeve," she explained patiently. "You wouldn't hafta be careful 'cause you'd be a zombie." She brightens. "But you could pull off your arm and reach the high ones!"

She waved her arms at this, and upset a switchboard. It clattered to the ground, scattering wires and tiny screws across the floor (and probably down the cracks between the boards, Reeve thought with a longsuffering sigh). Marlene squeaked, and backed away a few hasty steps. "Sorry, Mister Reeve!" She crouched to pick it all up, but Reeve waved her away with a grin.

"'s okay Marlene, I probably attached them all wrong, anyway. I'm better at plumbing." He scraped all the screws he could see into his cupped hand, and gestured to his empty mug. "Feel up to a coffee run? Aunt Elmyra probably needs your help with it."

Marlene's little chest puffed out with pride. "Aunt Tifa says I make the best martinis!" she told him, probably for the fourteenth time. He shakes his head. Too damn cute for her own good.

"When all this is over, you have to promise to make me one."

"'kay!"

She grabbed his coffee mug carefully and went jogging off, calling, "Aunt El-myyyy-raaaaaaaa!" Reeve swore he could hear Elmyra's caution about running with crockery through the walls. He rolled his own eyes - Marlene never learned - and went back to welding wires together.

Elmyra entered five or ten minutes later, carrying not only coffee but a plate with two biscuits on it. Reeve bit into the ginger one happily. "Fmhhnks."

Elmyra put her hands on her hips, a hint of mischief playing around her lips. "You're welcome," she said sincerely. "But would you mind telling me why Marlene just pounced on my lettuces, growling?"


End file.
